Pianist Shifts His Musical Direction

Pianist Shifts His Musical Direction

Bengtson Headed for Europe to Perform Bach and Rachmaninoff, After Recording Scriabin Here ... and Being Compared With Horowitz

PHILADELPHIA, June 6 /PRNewswire/ -- Both the European stage and American recording studio are performance venues these days for international performer Matt Bengtson.

On June 3, the Reading, PA-born pianist performed at the highly prestigious La Gesse Music Festival at the Hotel d'Assezat in Toulouse, France; and again will perform on June 18 for the same festival, this time at the Church of San Lorenzo in Florence, Italy.

Both performances are slated to begin at 8 p.m.

Bengtson's repertoire includes Bach's Goldberg Variations, BWV 988, and Rachmaninoff's Cello Sonata Opus 19, featuring Si-Yan Darren Li on cello. Li is an Artist Diploma student at Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, Maryland and a graduate of The Julliard School in New York City.

"EXTRAORDINARY PERFORMANCES"

Bengtson's European performances come on the heels of his recently completed compact disc recording of Alexander Scriabin's Piano Sonatas Numbers 3, 4, 5, 8, 9 and 10. After being recorded in Field Hall, Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, PA, the sonatas were released in March by Romeo Records and distributed worldwide by Qualiton Imports. (Romeo Records was founded in 1999 to provide a showcase for talented musicians, and to help ensure that their music could have the widest possible distribution both in the United States and abroad.)

The ten sonatas by the Russian composer have long been a staple of Bengtson's piano repertoire. "Mr. Bengtson's Scriabin playing is that of a great pianist," says Mordecai Shehori, concert pianist and a personal acquaintance of Vladimir Horowitz. "It is rooted in the style and quality of such legendary past Scriabin players as Horowitz and Sofronitzky."

This is Bengtson's third release, following "B! Music of Bach, Bartok and Brahms," a CD recorded last year; and the music of Karol Szymanowski, in a 2002 recorded CD of the Polish composer's mazurkas.

Also a fortepianist and harpsichordist, Bengtson teaches privately at Haverford College and the University of Pennsylvania, and serves on the piano staff of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. He has performed with the Reading, Pottstown and Ridgefield Symphony Orchestras and is an advocate of both contemporary and rarely performed music.

Bengtson's performance repertoire is varied, ranging from Rameau and Bach through Szymanowski and Scriabin to Berio and Ligeti. Critically acclaimed as a "musician's pianist," Bengtson is in demand as both soloist and collaborator. In 1998 he won the La Gesse Fellowship, sponsored by the Princess Cecilia di Medici; and went on to be presented in concert in France and Italy; at the French Embassy in Washington, D.C.; Thomas Jefferson's home of Monticello; and in solo recitals at Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall in New York City.

Source: Matt Bengtson

CONTACT: Matthew Bengtson, +1-215-704-4600 or mattbengtson@earthlink.net, or Publicist, Trish Doll, Publicity Works, +1-717-445-6377 or tdoll@publicity-works.com, for Matthew Bengtson

Web site: http://www.mattbengtson.com/

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